S-Clarke

Faes could do a job up front for us.

Interesting! He's done more than any of those guys in la liga this season from a wide position though, when you look at his output from the last 6 months. He's still pretty young though, so will need some time to adapt (which we don't have!)

Jackson is a wide man though isn't he, so I'd expect that kind of comparison when put next to a striker. Would be more interesting to see his stats up against Moussa or Ely?

You're spot on with that, I don't like the posts calling for his head. I also agree in that this isn't a panic or cheapo fix, this is a considered appointment. None of us know if it will work out yet, but it's unfair to say he's been appointed because he's cheap and we panicked. Far from it. He wouldn't have been my choice, but someone has seen something in him so all we can do is get behind that call. Fans are the same everywhere though, it's not just PL. Managers just don't get any time, they are judged almost immediately, whereas players are just allowed to swan around for years in the hope that they will 'fulfil their potential' under 'another manager'. It's clear to me where the problem has been with us, and has been for the last 5 years - the players. The recruitment has been shit, we blew millions on players we had to give away for free and then hamstrung ourselves in the market, so we had to look at the Perrauds, Lyancos and Armstrongs of the world to get by. The summer gone was a slight change up in that, Lavia and ABK in particular are two of the more impressive players we've signed in many years - who is to say Edozie and Mara won't join that list at a later date. I do feel as if the people in charge overestimated the level of 'experienced quality' in our squad though, and the approach to go all in with young players is looking a little foolish in the immediate term. I think it's too early to judge either SR or Jones in my opinion though, things won't change over night. I do wish we'd stop scoring own goals by offering contracts to the likes of Moussa and potentially Elyounoussi in the interim though.

When you look at us and the amount of goals we concede for fun, it's easy for an outsider who doesn't watch us to come to the conclusion that we need better CB's. But weirdly that's not exactly correct, we have very capable and athletic centre backs, but poor protection in front of them which leaves them horribly exposed. It's a worry if the people closer to the club than we are think that a new CB is needed, as it suggests they are slightly oblivious to the underlying issue. If they sort out DM then we can go with the current crop of CB's we have, no problems. DM and Attack is where the money needs to go.

That 'price is important' nonsense just builds the narrative in that we 'tried' but they wanted 'too much'. They make it sound like they're doing such a good job by telling us they won't be held to ransom, but how is that going? Oh yeah, staring down the barrel of lower league football and massive financial problems. Looking after the pennies on transfers seems to have made sense. Football players are overpriced, period. Transfer fees are always inflated by the selling club, we're good at that ourselves. If we only want to pay what we feel they're worth then we will be sliding down the leagues very soon.

I agree in what you say ''stop the NJ out rubbish' as we're shooting ourselves in the foot, but you can't then say if the players are in conflict he needs to go! As I said before, a lot of these players have been failures in whatever position we put them in. We should have the power to sack a lot of them for poor performance over a prolonged period of time, but that'll never happen as the players always manage to get their way. In an extreme example, Man Utd players have done the same. That club have let the players dictate who they want the manager to be, or who they don't want him to be. Yet none of those players have pulled up any trees themselves.

It's truly inept, talk about back to earth with a bump. We had years of beating records, high finishes, unbeaten at home runs etc (through L1/Champ/PL), and overnight we turned into one of the worst home teams we've ever been. Never a middle ground supporting us. We're either amazing or downright turgid.

It's a shame they didn't really perform with 4 at the back then isn't it, bar a purple patch. Not interested in their sob stories, they have been shit in a 3, 4 or 10 over the last however many years.

Personally I don't have any time for this (if the players are throwing their toys out). They have been SHIT for years, they are in no position to dictate anything. If this is true they need to STFU or get the hell out of my club, as they've stunk it out for years with their shitness.

They'll be patting themselves on the back when we bank a decent profit on him.

I hate those sort of snippets leaked from the club, along the lines of ''everyone internal is comfortable with the current situation'' ''we are relaxed'' etc etc etc. Nonsense bollocks that may have appeased a few people in the past, but it's wearing thin now. We have been a well run club in the past, and we did like to broadcast that fact, but there's no getting away that we are currently run pretty terribly and they are trying to make out to supporters that we are still well run. We're not.

That is exactly it. He's not what I'd call a world beater, so he's not at the level of a Gerrard or even a Rice who can pull a team through on his own, but he is decent in his own right if partnered with better players who allow him to do his role, rather than having to cover 50 different positions. JWP is the least of our worries. CM is a big issue for us, but we need to focus on adding better around him not 'selling him on' - that's not going to help us. The club have failed him this season more than anything by assuming he could perform that lynchpin role and totally undermining the protection a player such as Romeu actually provided.

It can't have been a footballing move, that's the only sense I can make of the Theo move. I think we brought him in with the hope he'd help us attract good young players/help mentor them and such. We might as well have just brought in a cheerleader to give them massages after every game.

The only guarantee you have with both of those guys is that they will spend a good % of the game on the floor after falling over or being outmuscled. I have no idea why we gave Moussa a new deal based on a few performances at LB, which isn't even his position. Those sort of decisions make me question the sanity of the people in control.

I wouldn't say battered, but they controlled the game and kept us at arms length for most of it. Sad to say but Brighton were in a different league in respect of how the passed and moved the ball, which allowed them to control the game. We couldn't get near them. It was only Brighton but they made it look like PL against Lower League at times - not through 'battering us' but through the sheer control they had over the ball. As soon as we got the ball we panicked, didn't know what to do, launched it long and that was that. On the few occasions we were able to get the ball to one of our players (i.e Moussa) their touch was so horrific that it went out for a throw. We really do have an incredibly limited team.

I don't think our players have the intelligence to do anything else. ''Oh a ball, let me pass it quickly to a player I can see. No idea if it's the best option''

This is what confuses me a little bit, the way we have played over previous years hasn't been consistent and we've had some horrendous runs, but there were always periods where we'd pickup and go again. We totally dumped that approach this season in favour of long ball. We are certainly more long ball than we have been for many years, and that seems to be the only tactic we have. Sadly when Adams is the focal point then we might as well just give the ball back to their GK every time to save his energy. A really peculiar change in approach given that we have no one suitable in the team to support that sort of game.

Because as depressing as it is to admit, he's much better than what we currently have available to us. Plus if we seem intent on playing long ball, we might as well go all-in and activate Burnley mode.

Playing Lynaco as front-sweeper to fill the Romeu void?

Saints in general are stuck in that period, we thought we'd cracked it as a club. Reality is that we just had a period of time where we got a bit lucky on a few fronts, similar to the time Brentford and Brighton are enjoying now. Not sustainable in any means for clubs of our size without substantial investment to stay there.

I guess we'll see in January. If SR wanted a striker, then I imagine they will personally spend that £30m in the first few days of January on someone they've hade lined up for months. But to me it feels like the usual club propaganda - ''we tried so hard, but just couldn't in the end''. Makes it look like there was money there etc, but actually the chance of us signing Gakpo was always pretty minimal to say the least. Look at Promes in that January window, ''we came so close, we tried so hard, ran out of time. We'll be back in during the summer'' etc etc. That obviously happened..!

Great moments, for real? I just remember misery, administration and the future of our club on an edge. I cannot remember any great moments.

To be honest these players have shown nothing over many years to be able to dictate the sort of manager they would 'listen to'. They need to STFU and get on with their jobs, because there are some players in that group who struggle to pass as professional footballers. They're the real problem here and always have been. I think Jones was an odd appointment, but calling for his head now is just going to create a toxic atmosphere when we don't need it.

I never buy this logic. Ask Stoke how they feel, it's a cesspit of a league when you're struggling. There is no guarantee that we'll go down there and have the fun we did in 2012. the 2008/9 ish period was pure misery, getting stuffed by 5 at Hull and Wednesday, getting turned over at home by Charlton etc. A truly miserable, miserable time. I can't think of anything worse, stuck in no mans land with your Lutons/Prestons/Birmingham's etc. Please don't bring that on.